What is your favourite parable told by Jesus? When I asked a group of people this question, I was not surprised that the prodigal son, the sower and the seed, and the good Samaritan ranked high. Eugene Peterson writes that his favourite parable is what he calls the manure story. We find it in Luke 13. Then [Jesus] told this parable: “A man had a fig tree growing in his vineyard, and he went to look for fruit on it but did not find any. So he said to the man who took care of the vineyard, 'For three years now I’ve been coming to look for fruit on this fig tree and haven’t found any. Cut it down! Why should it use up the soil?' 'Sir,’ the man replied, ‘leave it alone for one more year, and I’ll dig around it and fertilize it. If it bears fruit next year, fine! If not, then cut it down.’” (NIV) I have read this parable many times, but it never really stuck with me until I read Peterson's sermon on it in As Kingfishers Catch Fire . We tend to hear more ponderings a...
